RFK Jr, A Challenger to Biden, Polled Getting 14 Percent of Biden’s 2020 Voters Out Of The Gate With Fiery Announcement Speech

Robert Francis Kennedy Junior, the son of his famous father who shared his name and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, has some good news following his formal Democratic nomination bid announcement on Wednesday. A USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll finds that RFK Jr. has already garnered 14 percent of voters who went for Biden in 2020 with 67 percent of that voter group still backing Joe Biden. 13 percent of these voters are undecided while 5 percent of such voters are going for Marianne Williamson, who ran for the Democratic nomination back in 2020.

The poll itself had a pool of 600 Biden voters contacted through landlines and cellphones. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent. While the race is still a long shot for RFK Jr., David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, commented that “[T]he poll tells us that those same voters [for Biden in 2020] are open to other Democrats to wage a spirited primary. Kennedy, although a long shot at this point, starts in double digits and can’t be ignored.”

RFK’s father’s race for the White House in 1968 was also a long shot bid but the unpopularity of the Democratic President Lyndon Baines Johnson and Mr. Johnson’s decision not to run threw the race open. His father secured a major victory in California and had political momentum before he was assassinated.

According to USA TODAY, Mr. Kennedy Jr. draws his support in his 2024 bid for the presidency from “33% of Biden voters who disapprove of the job he is doing as president and 35% of those who say his policies in the White House have been ‘too liberal.’ The challenger’s appeal was strongest among self-identified conservatives, younger voters, and those who don’t have a college degree.”

Mr. Kennedy opened strongly in his nomination speech by saying that “I’m watching my country being stolen from me…I don’t want the Democratic party to be the party of Fear and Pharma and War and Censorship. We have to be more than neocons with woke bobbleheads. We need to stand up to corporations. We need to stand against war. We need to put our children first…That is what a Kennedy Democrat is.” 

🔥 Robert F. Kennedy Jr.:

"I'm watching my country being stolen from me…

I DON'T WANT the Democratic party to be the party of FEAR & PHARMA & WAR & CENSORSHIP…

We need to be more than neocons with woke bobble-heads…

I've spent my lifetime preparing for this office… pic.twitter.com/MqdC1yqea3

— New World Odor™ (@hugh_mankind) April 19, 2023

RFK Jr. was sympathetic to Trump in his speech when he stated that “He [Trump] had the right instincts, he knew that he shouldn’t have closed down the country. But he did it. He got rolled by his bureaucracy.”

Robert Kennedy Jr on Covid measures under Trump:

"He had the right instincts, he knew that he shouldn't have closed down the country. But he did it. He got rolled by his bureaucracy."pic.twitter.com/YjaYSMYSJ5

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) April 19, 2023

Mr. Kennedy made another pitch to voters through Twitter. He tweeted various comments in a thread. “We don’t have fair market capitalism. We have corporate crony capitalism, where the rules are written by billionaires and incumbents, and large corporations, to stack the deck against the middle class. Government should create rules that make Americans able to do well for themselves by doing good by each other, instead of forcing Americans to do well by poisoning each other and hurting each other, and privatizing the commons” wrote Kennedy.

He further wrote that “I believe in as little government as possible, but we need government there to be on the side of the little guy, rather than on the side of Wall Street and the big corporations.”

I believe in as little government as possible, but we need government there to be on the side of the little guy, rather than on the side of Wall Street and the big corporations. #cronyism #corporatism #environment

— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) April 19, 2023

It is often remarked by some in conservative circles that if JFK had been alive today he would have been a Republican. RFK Jr.’s stances against censorship and his call for a minimalistic government that is “on the side of the little guy” may ultimately place his positions [on those topics] in the modern Republican party. It remains to be seen whether there are still enough Democrats within the party who would vote for Mr. Kennedy. Yet, perhaps like his father in the California primary, RJK Jr. may defy the odds and be a surprisingly strong candidate.